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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
World
Dan Sabbagh in The Hague

‘Another big success’: Nato leader flatters Trump before The Hague summit

Trump, wearing a blue suit, walks to the palace doorway; guards in dark blue, gold and red uniforms stand to either side.
Donald Trump arrives at a dinner for Nato leaders hosted by King Willem-Alexander and Queen Maxima at Paleis Huis ten Bosch in The Hague, Netherlands. Photograph: Toby Melville/Reuters

In The Hague, the Nato summit waits for Donald Trump – and no one more so than the alliance’s secretary general, Mark Rutte. “You are flying into another big success,” Rutte wrote in a text on Tuesday, one of several released shortly afterwards by a hyperactive Trump as he travelled across the Atlantic in Air Force One.

The sycophantic messages from the Dutchman had compared Nato’s plan to dramatically increase defence spending to the US bombing of Iran’s nuclear sites over the weekend: “Congratulations and thank you for your decisive action in Iran, that was truly extraordinary, and something no one else dared to do.”

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